Digital Assignment: Comparing Shakespeare's Venus & Adonis to Other representations
The sheer number of works depicting Venus and Adonis is evidence that the story was compelling to artists contemporary with Shakespeare. You may have seen some of them before; others, like the painting by Cornelis van Haarlem (1562-1638) may be new to you. For this assignment, you'll use various websites to explore the two characters as they are portrayed together and apart.
1) Browse the pieces contemporary with Shakespeare's that depict Venus and Adonis together in any of the following museum sites:
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art
- The Getty Museum
- Museo del Prado
- Art UK (searches various national collections)
- Kunst Historiches Museum
2) Browse the same sites using just one name at a time: search for "Venus" and see what other representations you can find; then search as well for "Adonis" to see what representations you can find. If you're having trouble finding Adonis on his own or without Venus, conduct an image search on Google using "Adonis" and "art" or "painting" as search terms.
3) Choose one or two representations of both figures together as well as one or two images of Venus without Adonis or Adonis without Venus. Making sure you've copied over the citation information, insert the image(s) into a document. Then type up some notes about what you see. Consider the following:
- What do you notice about representations of Venus sans Adonis? What qualities do artists associate with her? What common features do you see across multiple depictions? Who else accompanies her--that is, when she's not pictured with Adonis––in artwork?
- What do you notice about representations of Adonis without Venus? How frequently do you see him without her? What qualities do artists associate with him?
